Political Quotes

“Madam President, I rise today in support of the motion to waive section 303 of the Budget Act and to allow the Senate to move forward with its consideration of the MilconVA appropriations bill. I would like to say for the record that I agree with the Senator from Alabama that it would be preferable for the Senate to have passed a budget resolution prior to its consideration of individual appropriations bills. In fact, on March 10 of this year, I stated my strong desire to move all of the fiscal year 2012 bills through regular order, which of course begins with the passage of a budget resolution and adoption of our 302(a) allocation. Unfortunately, such is not the case this year. As we are all painfully aware, the current impasse over the budget is a direct result of the unwillingness of some in Congress to negotiate a comprehensive solution to our long-term deficit problem. We are all well aware of these realities. It is my strong belief, however, that we must not allow the needs of our military or our veterans to be held hostage by the current budget stalemate. And while it is true that we do not have an overall allocation for discretionary appropriations, for the MilconVA bill we were able to agree with our House colleagues on an acceptable allocation. Therefore, there is no reason to delay consideration of this bill. It is important that all of our colleagues understand that what we are recommending is not unprecedented.…”